Faith is the very breath we live by. Every being is the effect of some cause and has been created for some purpose. Man has been made man for some cause he has to serve. Young persons must firmly believe in this cause-effect principle. This silver plate has a purpose. The plate did not exist as plate; it existed only as silver. So too, the pot is already in the mound of clay, as cause; it has not yet manifested as effect, at the hands of the potter. Cause and effect are indistinguishably intertwined---Avinaa-bhava-sambandham. Silver is the cause and plate is the effect; clay is the cause and pot the effect. In the same way, Divinity is the cause and Humanity is the effect.
The effect reveals the cause. The pot is the effect of clay. Why can’t pots be the effects of water or of sand? When the cause (the clay) assumes the form of the effect (the pot) it reveals itself in the effect. The Dharma (innate nature) of the cause will be evident in the effect also. Dharma means ‘vesture’, that which is worn. The effect has the same vesture, characteristic pattern, as the cause. (SSS Vol. 15, p. 37)